Plugin ideas... add yours here

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by BibiFlip

Hi all,
I would like to have a Plugin that writes the checksum of the file to a custom column (similar to the Page Count Plugin).

This are my use cases:
* Sometimes it's easier to compare the checksum of files to detect, if there are really identical. Otherwise, I need to investigate.
* It's useful to compare the checksums to a later time point to spot errors or corrupt files.
* It would be great, if the saved checksum could be used while importing new books as an additional to comparison of the metadata to spot duplicates.

What do you think?

If you load the exact same eBook as one that's already in the library and the name is the same, you will get a requester saying you might have a duplicate. Also, you can use the Find Duplicates plugin to find binary duplicates and duplicates that have a similar name/author in case they are not binary duplicates but different versions (like one was updated).

As to the corrupt files, that would be due to a hardware issue.

[capink]

@ownedbycats: That clarifies it. Thanks.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by capink

I believe you do not need to change cover or metadata to affect the checksum. Merely opening the file with calibre viewer can change the checksum as calibre inserts bookmarks into the file.

Not if you've turned this feature off.

Given the above I am curious as to how the Find Duplicates plugin performs its binary compare? Does it discard cover, metadata and bookmarks from files before comparing? Maybe someone can shed light on this.

A binary compare is just that a binary compare. But you can do a similar compare based on the metadata.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

If you load the exact same eBook as one that's already in the library and the name is the same, you will get a requester saying you might have a duplicate.

I think unless you have automerge turned on, in which case it just adds it to the existing book records.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

I think unless you have automerge turned on, in which case it just adds it to the existing book records.

I did forget of that option.

[BibiFlip]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

If you load the exact same eBook as one that's already in the library and the name is the same, you will get a requester saying you might have a duplicate. Also, you can use the Find Duplicates plugin to find binary duplicates and duplicates that have a similar name/author in case they are not binary duplicates but different versions (like one was updated).

As to the corrupt files, that would be due to a hardware issue.

Thanks for your detailed answer. I wasn't aware of the Find Duplicates plugin. It solves most of my problems. I already detected binary duplicates.

[Mansoul]

I would like something that displays 'how long to read'.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Mansoul

I would like something that displays 'how long to read'.

This can be done without a plugin. Or at least, not a new plugin. You need a column for either the page or word count. Then create another column that calculates time to read from the page and word count and your reading rate. You can enter the counts yourself, or use the Count Pages plugin to do it.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Mansoul

I would like something that displays 'how long to read'.

You can turn on time remaining to read for the entire book in the footer. Then create a custom column to enter the time remaining. That (IMHO) is the most accurate way to do it.

[Mansoul]

Thank you both, you set me on the path. I have more question but will take them to the main Calibre thread.

[JoeBethersonton]

I have been looking for plugin that can scrape meta data from Danish sites, and didn't find any.

So I downloaded a few other plugins to see the code, and it is a bit too complex for me - I never tried coding in Python.

I browsed a few possible sites, and would recommend mofibo.dk or saxo.dk.

Mofibo.dk seems to have most meta data - there is a category, tags, series information and ratings. The search engine is a bit weird though. If I search for a specific ISBN, the book will show up among a few others. If I click on the book, then it expands within the page with some information. If I right click and open the book in a new tab, then I have all the information available including the ISBN.

Saxo.dk has a better search engine, but the meta data seems inferior. Often it will only contain the name of a series, but not the number. Other times the tags will include stuff like age recommendations.

If anyone is up for the task, I will gladly help with everything I can - crawling through the HTML tags, translating stuff, finding good examples and test the plugin.

[HinzundKunz]

It would be absolutely awesome if calibre could be able to embed external images into pdf files as title pages. There are external tools that can do this, but it is a bothersome process to do it one file at a time. Within calibre you could just select all the pdf files you would want to do this on and it would be a batch process.
Why: I have a lot of pdfs that do not have a title page, they just start with the first page of the book. I have added title images to those, so that I recognize them easily.
When exporting pdf ebooks to my reader, the title images I added within calibre don't show. It would be nice if they would show as well, and the only way to do this is to embed them.
Within Linux, this is very easy on the command line:
cd "whatever directory the file is in"
convert cover.jpg cover.pdf
pdftk cover.pdf "whatever name the pdf has.pdf" output "whatever name you want to give.pdf"

But to do this for the ~450 files I know to not have any title page still is cumbersome. If I were more of a bash expert, I would just write a shell script that does this, but I'm not. Also, running a shell script on a set of subdirectories will also result in titles get reduplicated when there already is a title page.
My idea is a plugin that runs on selected titles within the library, so that on export to my reader, the title images show there as well.

It would be great, if someone more knowledgeable than me would pick this up...

[malaerba]

It would be nice to have
www.liberliber.it
in the book shops list. It is not a shop, it is public domain book (an other kind of file) source. Most part is in Italian. Download is free, but it is possible to donate.

Moreover: I am not a coder, but I think to be able to add the few needed lines if I have an example of other book shop in the list.

[pleiadesc]

Here is an idea, Author to Folder Label for folder management, this plugin will switch Author and a custom column Folder Label and can also reverse it back

Example
Author: John Schember
Folder Label: calibre-books

When you run the plugin, it would switch them like this
Author: calibre-books
Folder Label: John Schember

in the calibre database folder you will have folder calibre-books instead of the author name. its one solution for those who like to use windows file explorer to view their books.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by pleiadesc

Here is an idea, Author to Folder Label for folder management, this plugin will switch Author and a custom column Folder Label and can also reverse it back

Example
Author: John Schember
Folder Label: calibre-books

When you run the plugin, it would switch them like this
Author: calibre-books
Folder Label: John Schember

in the calibre database folder you will have folder calibre-books instead of the author name. its one solution for those who like to use windows file explorer to view their books.

I suspect that you haven't read the sticky on calibre's structure.

You may enjoy what can happens when this is run on multiple folders. Nothing like a dozen directories all called calibre-books (xxx) to make life fun deciding what author name was originally attached to the directory.

I would suggest reading this stickied message:
Want to change folder structure or file names in the Calibre library? plus any of the links in it.